Fieldwork and Language Documentation

CLA updates

January 26, 2025

Here's the latest from the California Language Archive:

Did you miss our end-of-year newsletter? Read it here! We have made available digital copies of 11 cassette tape recordings made by musicologist Susana Weich-Shahak in Peru in 1974 and 1975, consisting of stories, songs, and conversations in Arakmbut (Harakmbut), Ashaninka (Arawakan), Máíjĩ̵̀kì (Tukanoan), and Yagua (Peba-Yaguan), from the communities of Shintuya, Cutivireni, Sucusari, and Catalán, respectively (listen to an excerpt of Luis Ríos's (Bábì) story of Maineno in Máíjĩ̵̀kì here). The larger collection, the Colección de Materiales de Lenguas Peruanas de Susana Weich-Shahak, was previously accessioned, and additionally includes 8mm film and photographic slides, all of which are also now digitized. Zachary Wellstood, together with Nellie and R. David Zorc, has accessioned Documenting Aklanon Morphosyntax. The collection consists of materials spanning a field methods course at the University of Maryland in 2018 and 2019, with Maria Polinsky and Omer Preminger (recordings and notes in bundles 001-021), and telephone-based research afterward. The documentation focuses on grammatical topics.

Language Revitalization Working Group

The Language Revitalization Working Group offers a space to critically examine theories, methodologies, and applications of language revitalization in a variety of world contexts. Additionally, we provide a centralized venue for interdisciplinary researchers and practitioners of language revitalization to share, present, discuss, and improve their language revitalization efforts.

In Spring 2025, we will meet every other Wednesday from 3-4 p.m. (PST) in a hybrid format: if you're on campus you can join us in-person, and if you're not, you can join via...

Mam course offered at UC Berkeley

January 19, 2025

The Center for Latin American and Caribbean Studies just launched a free (non-credit) Mam class for the spring semester. See here for more information.

Berkeley linguists present at SSILA

January 22, 2025

Congrats to the Berkeley linguists who will be presenting their work at the Annual Meeting of the Society for the Study of the Indigenous Languages of the Americas, taking place online from January 24 to 26:

Anna Björklund: "The structure of the Nomlaki verb" Maksymilian Dąbkowski: "Teasing the A'ingae discourse and conditional marking apart"

New review of Garrett book

December 12, 2024

A review by Chloé Laplantine of Andrew Garrett's book The Unnaming of Kroeber Hall: Language, Memory, and Indigenous California has appeared in the journal Histoire Épistémologie Langage 46/2 (2024): ...

Michael receives Fulbright-Hayes Faculty Research Abroad Fellowship

December 5, 2024

Lev Michael will be on research leave during Spring and Fall 2025 to carry out research supported by a Fulbright-Hays Faculty Research Abroad Fellowship. Lev is planning to work with speakers of four Arawakan languages, Asháninka, Ashéninka, Nomatsigenga, and Yanesha', on a variety of topics aimed at clarifying the historical and language contact relationships among Peruvian Arawakan languages and their non-Arawakan neighbors. Congrats, Lev!

CLA Updates

November 21, 2024

Here's the latest from the California Language Archive:

This week we host the fourth visit supported by the new CLA Community Research Grant: Kawaiisu community members and collaborating linguists (left to right) Merlene Everson, Laura Grant, Sophia Kendrick, and Brandi Kendrick. They are consulting on the cataloging of the forthcoming Maurice L. Zigmond Collection of Uto-Aztecan Language Materials acquired in April of last year. The CLA has previously collaborated with Grant, Everson, and others to archive the born-digital collection Kawaiisu Conversations and Landscapes Project, which features the voices of Everson's mother, the late Betty Girado Hernandez, her aunt, and uncle.

Kawaiisu CLA visit

CLA Updates

September 26, 2024

Here's the latest from the California Language Archive:

We've accessioned digital copies of 18 wax cylinder recordings held by the Hearst Museum of Anthropology as part of our efforts to finish digitizing the collection of wax cylinders at UC Berkeley (see here for more...

UC Berkeley linguistics department offers couse on Kalaallisut language

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‘Welcome!’

This fall the Department of Linguistics at UC Berkeley offers students a unique opportinuty to learn about Kalaallisut, the official language of Greenland. The course is co-taught by Kalaallisut speakers Ellen Thrane and Grethe Schmidt and linguist Line Mikkelsen. The students in the...

Berkeley linguists at Language Documentation and Archiving conference

September 5, 2024

Becky Jarvis, Tzintia Montaño Ramírez, and Zachary O'Hagan are in Berlin this week giving presentations and posters at Language Documentation and Archiving at the Berlin-Brandenburgische Akademie der Wissenschaften (pictured here with organizing committee member Kelsey Neely, PhD 2019; Amalia Skilton, PhD 2019; and Bernat Bardagil, postdoc 2018-2020).

Berkeley linguists at Language Documentation and Archiving conference